Mark Vieth has extensive experience working with clients seeking to create and expand research opportunities at the Congressionally-Directed Medical Research Program (CDMRP) at the Department of Defense (DoD). He currently serves as the coordinator of the Defense Health Research Consortium (DHRC), which he helped to found in 2014 to bring together the diverse community of patient advocacy organizations, medical provider groups, veterans’ organizations, research advocacy groups, and private sector interests that care about CDMRP. Originally formed with a dozen members, the DHRC now includes more than 50 organizations. The DHRC’s advocacy has contributed to a significant increase in funding for the DHRC in the past ten years, as well as successful efforts to stop legislative efforts in 2015-2017 that would have effectively terminated the program.
In addition to providing leadership for the DHRC, Mark has helped clients create and grow programs within the CDMRP, including the following:
- The Bone Marrow Failure Disease Program (creation in FY08)
- The Pancreatic Cancer Research program (creation in FY20 at $6 million, grown to $15 million annually)
- Tuberous Sclerosis Complex Research Program:(grown from $1 million to $8 million annually).
- Brain Cancer: Included as an eligible condition in the Peer Reviewed Cancer Research Program (creation in FY17)
- Peer Reviewed Medical Research Program: (inclusion of “vascular malformations”, “peripheral neuropathy” and “von-Hippel Lindau syndrome” as eligible conditions).
